What is the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form?

This article explains what the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form is and how it is used.

What are the other options for a company starting a matching gift program?

How is the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form generated?

Why is the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form helpful for donors, nonprofits, and companies?

What does the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form look like?

Which companies accept the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form?

Companies accept matching gift requests in a wide range of formats, from online portals to PDFs. This can get confusing for donors and hard for nonprofit organizations to guide them through! Plus, companies have a hard time deciding how they want to manage matching gift submissions.

That's why Double the Donation offers the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form. This form contains all the information about a gift that a company needs to process a matching gift request, generated and sent automatically when a donor opts in. Any company can decide they wish to accept this standard form to make things easier for their internal processing team, their employees, and the nonprofits they support.

How is the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form generated?

Let's say a donor, Nicole, works for a company that accepts the Double the Donation standard form. When Nicole makes a match-eligible gift to a Double the Donation client, Nicole will be happily notified that her gift can be matched by her company! All she needs to do is provide very few pieces of additional information and check a box authorizing Double the Donation to submit a matching gift request on her behalf. Once she takes these steps, the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form is generated as a PDF and automatically emailed to the matching gift processing point of contact at her company.

The great news? From the donor's perspective, it works exactly like Double the Donation's auto-submission partnership with your favorite workplace giving platforms!  Want to dive further into Double the Donation's autosubmission functionality?  Learn more about autosubmission and the matching module here.

Why is the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form helpful for donors, nonprofits, and companies?

Donors face an array of challenges when attempting to submit matching gift requests. They could use the wrong form, fill out a form incorrectly, not submit it promptly or to the right person at their company, etc. Did you know that incorrectly filling out a form is one of the leading causes of rejected matching gift requests? The Double the Donation standard form removes some of these significant barriers. The process of generating the form is simple and quick, and Double the Donation collects and validates the information needed for the request. The result? More matching gift requests are correctly formatted and submitted than ever before.

Nonprofits waste a lot of valuable operations time assisting donors through frustrating submission scenarios. And they can't be expected to keep track of the thousands of unique different forms, portals, and processes in use by each matching gift program. This standard form allows companies to take a standard approach that's easier for nonprofits to plan for. Plus, nonprofits can rest easy knowing that any company that uses the standard form is making matching as easy as possible for donors.

Companies starting a matching gift program have a choice to make. Will they purchase an online matching gift solution? Will they ask their donors to email their HR department with a donation receipt? Generally, most companies realize that they need something in the middle: Some standard matching gift form to collect the relevant information about the employee and their donation, which will work as their program matures enough to justify purchasing a solution to manage the process. At this point, companies create their matching gift form that nevertheless collects mostly the same information as every other company's unique matching gift form. When donors use the process to generate and send the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form, the company receives beautifully formatted, validated, accurate information that allows them to quickly process the matching gift request.

What does the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form look like?

Which companies accept the Double the Donation Standard Matching Gift Request Form?

Many! In particular:

1. Any nonprofit organization using Double the Donation Matching Enterprise can indicate that a company will accept the standard form when they set up a company program directly in the matching module. Learn more about these programs here.

2. Any company that notifies Double the Donation of a new or updated matching gift program can opt into accepting the standard form as part of the notification process. 

3. Many companies have their PDF forms with fields that directly correlate to the fields on the Double the Donation standard form. These companies can accept the standard form in addition to or in place of their form if they wish.

Double the Donation highly recommends companies starting a matching gift program consider working with a workplace giving solution.  Learn more about our partner workplace giving platforms here.